halloween fun!

Survived my first holiday celebration!  It was a wild day but so much fun!  I had already prepared myself for a lot of craziness, but I was really pleased with my students' behavior!  We were so excited about what all was going on, and sometimes it was hard to keep the excitement inside, but we all were able to keep things under control. 
Every day in the month of October we read the book Big Pumpkin by Erica Silverman.  The teacher I worked with last year introduced me to this book.  It's best if you have the audio tape!  I was VERY excited to find the tape in things my aunt had given me over the summer!  It quickly became my students' favorite too.  I loved hearing my students reading along with the book.  During centers they loved to read the book.  I was very sad it was our last time to read it.
We also sang Witches' Brew several times too! I read a couple of Halloween books, and as I read them I turned the lights off, closed the blinds, and held a flashlight up at my face to make things more spooky!  I told my students the spooky story of In a Dark Dark Wood. 
In a dark, dark wood there was a dark, dark house;
And in the dark, dark house there was a dark, dark room;
And in the dark, dark room there was a dark, dark cupboard;
And in the dark, dark cupboard there was a dark, dark shelf;
And on the dark, dark shelf there was a dark, dark box;
And in the dark, dark box there was a....ghost!
At the end I make sure to say it a lot louder, and my students screamed like little babies!  Then we all laughed and laughed.  I went to the other Kindergarten classes and told them too.  It was really funny to watch their reactions.
We had started our orange and black celebration off with a pumpkin hunt.  I found these cute pumpkins at Target that are like Easter eggs and we went on a pumpkin hunt!  We made Monster Mash to eat.  I asked students to bring in the ingredients.  A few things I included were raisins...aka scabs, marshmallows...aka ghost poop, peanuts...aka knee joints, pretzel sticks...aka skeleton bones, white chocolate chips...aka vampire teeth, peanut butter chips...aka bat droppings, and candy corn...aka monster teeth.

They loved all the food we had!  I was pleased to tell the parents that the next day they got to stay home because it was a teacher work day!  The sugar rush kids were all theirs!!!  They did thank me!!!

Once they finished it was mummy time!  I had been so excited about this game.  I let 5 different children be wrapped up!  They absolutely loved it!!!!  They did a really good job working together, and one group even gave their mummy a bow!

We also played Guess the Ghost!  I had a white sheet, had all the students close their eyes, and then I chose one student who was the ghost, and all the other students had to guess who it was under the sheet!  They got really excited while playing this.  It was really cute! 

It was a great day!  It went really fast.  Looking forward to our next celebration!!!

During the party I heard one student say..."Isn't this best Halloween party you have ever had!"

I couldn't agree any more!!!

spiders

The past two weeks I did a unit study on spiders.  I really don't like spiders that much so it was a little hard.  I sucked up being a baby about it and enjoyed teaching and learning about spiders.  I started the unit by graphing each student's opinion of liking spiders or not liking spiders. 

I could not believe they all said they liked spiders!  I was afraid they were just saying it because that is what their friend said.  I asked if I were to bring live spiders and put them all around the room the next day would they be okay with it or not (they did ask the next day where the spiders were).  The next morning I had a student raise his hand and ask if he could change his spider because he decided he really didn't like spiders!  I found a great unit online about spiders.  I am sorry I can't tell you what the website was because I don't remember!  Sorry!  I will keep looking for it.  I got some good ideas from the unit and I also went to our public library and checked out a "story bag."  Our library has tons of these bags on different themes.  I was lucky to find one about spiders.  There were great non fiction books and some fiction.  We learned lots of interesting facts about spiders.
We learned all about the body of a spider and the features spiders have.  We learned that they eat insects.  An idea from the unit I used was to have students look at pictures of different insects and spiders and decided if it is an insect or a spider.  If we couldn't tell by looking we just counted the legs.   
My sister's friend from school brought me some spider cut outs from her mom.  They were so cute, and I wanted to make sure I used them in as many ways as I could. 
I gave each student a spider and each drew pictures with the spider on his paper.  They turned out really cute.  I loved to see where they decided to put their spider.  Some put the spider on its web, some were in the garden, and some were hanging from its silk!

To finish our unit we wrote all the facts we learned about spiders and put them on our web!



witches' brew!

I love fall time in the classroom.  So many fun things to do!  Lots of ways to integrate science and social students into your units!  I have had fun the past month talking about apples, pumpkins, fall, and most recent spiders! 
This week I am excited about Halloween and wanted to hurry and share this just in case some readers wanted to use it!  I downloaded Witches' Brew by Hap Palmer from iTunes and then made a book.  I like to use books with some of my songs.  It especially helps when we are singing it the first time so they know what words to be singing!  It is just a fun, silly song to sing at Halloween!
We sang it several times today and as the students were lining up for the bus they were still singing and doing the dance we made up!  I am sure the parents will tell me about their children singing this song too!!!
Feel free to use the book I made! 
Witches' Brew Book

enjoy the week of halloween!!!  we are!!!

toliet paper

Next week for our "orange & black" celebration I have planned some games and fun snacks.  I sent home notes with my students yesterday with what I wanted each student to bring.  I didn't expect for my students to bring them back the next day but they did!  One parent told me at lunch today that her son HAD to go get his stuff last night!!!  He really remembers everything that is said in class!
While I was looking for games and crafts to play next week I saw a mummy wrap game.  I decided that we would give it a try.  I have 5 groups in my class so I figured I will draw a name from each table and they will be the one wrapped up in toilet paper like a mummy. 
I asked 5 students to bring in a roll of toilet paper.  When the first roll came in this morning I first laughed because it was funny to just see a roll of toilet paper come in!  I then asked the student if his mom wondered why I asked for a roll of toilet paper.  He told me he did but then the class started to ask why!  I told them I couldn't tell them until our party.  One student began to guess!  He asked if we were going to go toilet paper someones house!  I laughed a lot and then asked him if he had ever done it.  He said no.  I asked if someone had done it to his house.  He said no.  I asked how he knew about toilet papering someones house and he told me he saw it on TV. 
Glad they are teaching these kinds of things on TV these days!!!!

+ = lots of fun!!!